Mutual
by Amarthame
Summary: They were rivals. That was the way they had always wanted it, that was the way it had always been. But the more things stay the same, the more they change. ZADR.
1. Pathetic and Untimely

**Series: **Invader Zim

**Pairing(s): **ZADR (aka Zim/Dib)

**Summary:** They were rivals. That was the way they had always wanted it, that was the way it had always been. But the more things stay the same, the more they change.

**Disclaimer: **Invader Zim and all related characters, etc. are the property of Nickelodeon.

**Other Notes:** Ever since I first watched Invader Zim, I could see Dib and Zim getting together. It was something that felt almost inevitable to me, but I was faced with this big, glaring problem: How? I honestly couldn't figure out exactly how to get them together in a good, believable way. There's been a lot of fanfiction regarding that, I guess, but I never could quite believe most of what that fanfiction proposed, so I'm posting my own little "beginnings of Zim and Dib's relationship" fic. As such, it's not fluffy or overly romantic or anything of the sort. For the most part, the ZADR is extremely mild and fairly subtle to begin with.

As always, if you like this fic, please review. ;) It gives me a reason to keep on writing.

I'll cease boring you now. On with the fic.

**------**

Even if the Tallest themselves had pumped him full of truth serum and had him explain, it wasn't something he could make them, or any other Irken, understand. Perhaps it was because he was defective, so far below all the other Irkens and therefore flawed in his every thought. Or perhaps it was a sign of his superiority to all others, a nod to some attribute of his so amazing that even he himself would never quite understand what it was. Or perhaps it was something else entirely, but Zim didn't like to question things like "why," especially regarding this. He hardly even liked to admit it to himself, but during those rare moments when he caught himself considering it, he could feel his eyes held open to the profound significance of that one crucial fact: He couldn't pinpoint when it began, but after a certain point, the mission stopped mattering.

He had worked unwaveringly day and night for the past eight years to come up with one final plan that would destroy the inhabitants of this Earth that he despised so much, to see them scatter like autumn leaves at his feet and run around, panicked, like he had heard inferior creatures often do when the Organic Sweep of their planet begins. He wanted to see them realize just how foolish and wrong they had been about him as they laughed at and mocked and ignored him as though he, the great and almighty Zim, was as unimportant as a filthy little ant. He wanted them to see him as a threat—no, as the biggest threat ever to touch down upon their, or any other planet. He was, after all, Zim. How many times had he promised them that he would rule their revolting little rock? More than he could count, in any case, and he never for a second even came close to considering that he would not fulfill that promise.

He wanted to see the expressions on the faces of his Almighty Tallest when he contacted them and let them see that he had conquered all of Earth without any help from the Armada or from any other invader, though he had no idea how he was going to contact them with the Massive programmed to block his messages. He supposed he could hack his way through, contact Prisoner 777 and ask for another way to get his transmissions through to his Tallest. It wasn't as though he hadn't already tried all that, but if he could complete his mission, there would be no way the Tallest could continue to reject him! He dreamed of that day, the day when they would bring him back out of exile and re-encode him once more, as the greatest invader alive! The invader who had proven himself, by adding another planet to the Irken Empire all with his own two superior hands and what had become minimal supplies. He wanted that victory, that one spectacular victory beneath which to sweep all smaller victories and failures, as proof that he, Invader Zim, was as great—no, even greater than he had ever said himself.

But all of that, all of those treasures that he knew would lie in wait for him at that one, final victory, had begun to scare him, not that he would ever admit it. Because, over time, he couldn't have helped but to watch Dib grow and age and he had watched as he had become taller (taller than even the Tallest, it seemed) and his reflexes more developed. And Zim had watched as his neighbors around him had become increasingly slower, dimmer, and grayer with age. He had watched as his classmates had grown and changed and gone their separate and equally revolting ways, aging like Dib and becoming complete human adults. They were still humans, their intellects had hardly changed, but nobody could say that they were the same kids as they had been in Ms. Bitters's class. In the span of only eight of Earth's years, nearly everything had changed. Ms. Bitters had retired, Dib and Zim had gone on to Hi Skool and graduated in a blink of Zim's Irken eye. He had gotten a few new neighbors, and lost a few as well by various means, some of which he preferred to leave unmentioned. He had developed a growth serum in order to keep up with Dib in height, though he could never get himself as tall as Dib without risking catastrophic results. But catastrophic results could hardly be avoided after the first time he with his new height had reported to the Tallest. They were shocked, profoundly shocked, and angrier than Zim could have expected.

Angers flew and sparked as the Tallest demanded that he return back to his proper size, fearing that he would become some kind of menace to their power. And Zim didn't understand, couldn't understand, and so he yelled out in his confusion. He was, after all, the greatest of all the invaders! So what if Operation Impending Doom had gone to a bad end because of him? Had he not displayed more potential as a soldier than any other invader? Had he not taken on the whole of Irken civilization and come so very close to winning? Who if not Zim, the amazing and all-powerful Zim, deserved this great height? He did, after all, blow up more than any other invader! His feats were more impressive than those of any other Irken, and the Tallest had to see that!

But they, of course, didn't. That had been they day when they had finally deleted his existence from the Irken Control Brain and warned him of the charges that faced him should he ever return to Irken territory. Zim was, needless to say, shocked. He tried and he tried to get his messages through, to get the Tallest to tell him that it was all just one big joke, but after a week of trying harder and harder to communicate with the Massive, he realized it was futile. But that didn't mean a thing, all it meant was that the Tallest were testing him! He couldn't just give up! So he didn't; he simply contacted whatever useful connections he had to prisoners or guards or whoever he could think of, had them send messages for him. And when those messengers were arrested for contacting the Tallest on Zim's behalf, he even tried to fly the Voot Cruiser to the Massive himself!

Accidentally breaking a hole in one of the snack pods was hardly a good start to that negotiation. Being arrested by the Tallests' personal guards was even worse; and escaping arrest! Between breaking all those Irken laws, he hardly had a spare moment in which to beg his Almighty Tallests' forgiveness.

So he had to come to accept that the Tallest were not simply testing him. He was forced to accept that his leaders no longer wanted him in their Empire. But after the initial shock, the initial mind-blowing, year-long shock, Zim found that all these changes—the Tallest not accepting him, the entire population of Earth aging around him, Skool falling out of his daily routine—meant very little to him, despite their obvious significance and how quickly they seemed to have flown into him and then past him, because one thing never changed.

Zim still worked day and night to defeat Dib, and Dib still worked day and night to defeat Zim. Zim wanted to take control of the Earth, yes, and of course he wanted to please the Tallest and get them to accept him back as the great Irken invader he was, but he needed to continue to fight and quarrel and try to defeat Dib. He needed that victory above all others, despite the lack of promised glories that would come with it. He needed the rivalry, the challenge greater than all challenges he had ever come face-to-face with. And though he would never let himself admit it, Zim could not stop this twisted tug-of-war even if he really, truly wanted to, not until he won.

And Zim couldn't pinpoint quite when it occurred, but even that stopped being the case. Because he knew, despite not wanting to think about it, that after that final victory, that would be it. There would be no more fighting, because there would be no more need to win. And Dib wouldn't need to be a part of his life anymore, because Dib would have lost and have been killed or enslaved or worse by either Zim himself or by the Armada that was sure to come. And despite the obvious glory that would come at the completion of his mission, at being accepted back into Irken society, at proving his worth, the bleak and peaceful emptiness that lay beyond the end of his endless war with Dib instilled something in the Irken that he could recognize as being something quite like fear.

He supposed that he realized it the first time he had really caught Dib. It wasn't as though it was really the first time in their long rivalry, but this time was different. Dib's father would be away in Germany disproving the Law of Conservation of Matter all week that week, and Dib's sister had no reason to care for her brother's well-being. Yes, this time, everything had been perfect. They had been no way—absolutely no way that Dib could have possibly escpaed. Zim remembered almost too well the infinitely exhilarating feel of that amazing victory. Standing far above the Dib on metallic legs protruding from his PAK, grinning victoriously at the human his defense system had pinned helplessly to the wall of Zim's lab, staring into defiant, golden-amber eyes that hid a panicking realization that Zim may have truly, finally won their eternal game of cat-and-mouse.

Zim remembered the sheer ecstasy coursing through him as he laughed maniacally, smirking at his frightened human prey. "Victory!" he remembered proclaiming, "Sweet victory at last! Zim has caught the human stink-beast!"

He took a short break to grin cruelly at Dib and to nurture his rant in his head briefly before he unleashed it. "I must admit, you disgusting little worm-baby, it took longer than I expected, but surely you could not have expected any other end than this. No little Earth-stink can stop the great Zim!" He drew himself closer to the human on his mechanical legs, positioning himself so that the most prominent thing in Dib's vision would be Zim's big, red eyes, burning bright with victory. "Know this, Dib-stink, from here it is only a call to the Armada and then your entire filthy, filthy race i—"

"A call to the Armada? Ha!" Dib's voice was shaking, bestowed with a false confidence it couldn't maintain. "You know I've been watching you, Zim, and we both know your Armada's not just going to show up at the doorstop of some degenerate fry cook!'

"Silence!" Zim demanded, punching at a large button on a nearby screen and administering a slight electric shock on Dib's body. He ignored the human's scream of pain as he narrowed his eyes and continued his rant, "You know nothing, you filthy worm! So what if the Armada doesn't come?! Your people are so far beneath me, the great and powerful Zim, that I don't need the Armada! Just one of my ingenious plans, and without you to screw things up, the humans will all be gone before you know it!" Zim scowled at Dib challengingly, then smirked, pleased at Dib's reluctance to say anything more.

"That is, human, if I even let you live that long." Zim poised one of his metallic legs over the human's heart, ready to strike, antennae perking forward as he heard the human's breath catch in his throat.

"You are scared, yes?" the Irken all but purred.

"No, Zim, wait! Are you really gonna let it end like this?!" Dib pleaded, not once taking his eyes off of the sharp tip only inches away from his rapidly beating heart. "Even if you... if you kill me, and take over Earth, what happens then?! Your leaders don't even want Earth!"

"I told you to make silence, human!"

"Wait, wait, listen to me! Who's ever going to admire anything you're doing here besides your mortal enemy?! Come on, Zim, you need me!" Dib poured out whatever words he could find, anything to get himself out of this impossible situation. "I... Zim, ple—"

"Do not defy Zim!" the Irken shouted menacingly, administering another shock on his human prey, succeeding in rendering Dib unconscious. "I called for silence, stink-boy," Zim hissed into the unconscious human's face before lowering himself to the floor and putting his metallic legs away.

Zim took in the helplessness on Dib's unconscious face. "Computer, let go of him," he ordered distractedly as he stared seriously at his prey. It was his victory, and he could feel the pride inherent in that swelling up within him. But more than that, he felt hesitation. He could have killed Dib there and then, could have gotten rid of the only thing keeping him from completing his mission. But this human...

"Humans are so disgustingly weak..." he spat out, taking out his communicator. "GIR! Get down here!"

"Yes, my master!" GIR replied promptly and obediently with steely red eyes, propelling himself down the elevator tube into the lab. His eyes, flashing back to blue almost immediately as he landed, spotted the unconscious Dib lying helpless on the floor and grinned. "Hey! It's Dib! When'd he get here?"

"When you were supposed to be keeping him out of here, GIR," replied Zim through clenched teeth.

"I made him some biscuits!" exclaimed GIR happily, opening up the top of his head to reveal hot biscuits smeared in honey. He dumped them onto the floor beside the human, then watched Dib expectantly for a moment. When he didn't move, GIR frowned sadly. "What'sa matter? You no like biscuits?"

"He's unconscious." Zim glared at the little robot, who now looked even littler than ever before to him, now that Zim was taller.

"Oh..." GIR said in what was almost understanding, then grinned again, crouching down next to Dib. "You and my master have fun playing together?" Then he gasped giddily, "Wanna come play with me and pig next time?!"

"GIR! That's enough already, he's unconscious!" snapped Zim, annoyed. He pointed towards the elevator. "Get him out of here! That's an order!"

"Okie-dokie!" sang GIR as he picked Dib up against his back and flew off up the elevator shaft. It was likely an odd sight, a lanky teenage boy being dragged along by a tiny robot nuisance, but Zim didn't see it.

Zim didn't watch as his robot took his hard-earned prey and set it it free. He was busy thinking, realizing that without Dib, there was nothing left for him on this accursed planet. Taking it over was hardly worth the effort without that challenge that Earth boy presented, after all. What use did the Irken Empire have for such a worthless planet? Dib was by far the planet's most and only valuable asset. And besides, Zim had hardly been fighting Dib for long enough to show the puny human just what kind of spectacular feats he was capable of. He'd destroy the Dib another time, with other methods. This was nothing close to a fitting end. It was pathetic and untimely, better suited to a bird found nesting in his telescope lens than to his greatest enemy.

That was five years ago. Since then, Zim had captured and nearly destroyed Dib twice more: once in the upper level of Zim's base, and once in the Hi Skool's boiler room. The first time he let the human escape on his own. The situation had been, although occurring over a year after the previous capture, far too similar. It disgusted Zim that Dib was still so weak that he could allow himself to be captured like this twice. But the next time was different; Zim had no defensive system installed there in the Hi Skool to assist him. That made it a more complete victory, with Zim against Dib and their strengths almost evenly matched. What Dib lacked in training he made up for in height, what Zim lacked in height he made up for in training, and their physical, muscular strengths had little difference between them by now. But Zim's PAK gave him a considerable advantage over the human, and Dib's wit and innovation proved less than a match as he fell from his place, suspended from a pipe running high along a wall and landed on the floor. He was unconscious by the time Zim walked over to him, and thus Zim walked away, laughing victoriously to himself.

Dib didn't ask questions after the very first time Zim had released him ("I don't have to explain myself to a filthy Earth-monkey!" Zim had claimed), but instead had lived up to Zim's expectations as a formidable opponent. He had captured Zim twice now, once in his father's own lab, and each time he let Zim get away. It pleased the Irken, knowing that he could assault and attack the human at his full capacity and always meet resistance worthy of an Irken invader, knowing that on those rare occasions when he did capture the human, he could simply release the Dib and the chase would begin anew. It satisfied him, knowing that he could experience the thrill and adrenaline rush of a high-risk caper in which the odds against him were staggeringly high, because even if Dib did capture him, Zim had come to trust the human (though he'd never really call it trust) enough to know that he never would end up on an alien autopsy table by Dib's hands.

Their rivalry fulfilled Zim, their almost-poetic banter of insult against insult, taunt against threat, threat against warning, decreasingly childish as time went on until it became purely a battle of Dib's superior wit against Zim's stubborn self-confidence. And when words became actions, their complicated mix of real and pulled punches designed to yield a victor but not a casualty became as ritualistic as the Irken Probing Day. And when physical brawls became battles for the fate of the world, Zim knew they could go all out against each other with whatever technology they could access, be it laser cannons or water balloons, and even in deep space Dib would always survive and Zim would never let himself die so easily.

Zim, after eight years, had become quite thorough in his understanding of the interdependent relationship that he held with his mortal enemy. He understood: they were the same, seeking out their respective purposes after being cast aside like corpses by their respective societies. One thrives at the cost and eternal benefit of the other, watching them suffer and then watching them rise to meet the challenge with an ever-burning fire of hope and trust and faith that no matter who would be the victor, this war needed to go on.

It really, truly fulfilled the Irken more than he could ever describe, and he knew (though would never admit) that it had nothing to do with achieving an ultimate winner or loser.

And that was why Zim needed to keep Dib alive, without regard to whoever would win their perpetual game, their war, their eternal rivalry. Watching the human age and become closer and closer to a pathetic and untimely death that would come all too soon was beyond the Irken's capacity, not that he'd admit it, and he knew that he needed to do something to prevent it. And that was a realization he had made four years ago, when the two of them had entered Hi Skool and received that speech about how their actions there would change the rest of their "short, doomed lives."

So, even if nobody, not even the Almighty Tallest, could quite understand it, the PAK Zim had finally succeeded in creating for his mortal enemy was just as important an aspect to Earth's destruction as anything else. After all, if Zim was going to win the fight for Earth, he'd have to win the fight against Dib first. And there was no way he could do that properly in the human's short, pathetic life span.


	2. Thank you

It didn't take long after Zim arrived on Earth for Dib to realize that he had a lot to thank the alien for. He doubted he'd ever get the chance to actually thank him, but he was more than certain that that didn't matter to Zim in the least. He watched Zim day in and day out, whether from the opposite end of the classroom at school during a test, or from right next to him in the cafeteria as he commented on Zim's lack of eating habits, or on a monitor in Dib's room connected to numerous cameras he had installed in Zim's base. And from the many things he learned and took note of and analyzed and over-analyzed, nothing implied that the Irken placed much value in a simple "thank you."

But Dib, he knew it was important; after all, it was like a condensed version of everything Dib contributed to the rivalry. Not that he thought Zim would understand and not that he _cared_ whether or not Zim understood, but it was still a very important thanks.

Before Zim had arrived, Dib often dreamed of being the one to open the world's eyes to the paranormal. Bringing a vampire out of the shadows for the residents of his city to see, proving to them not only the existence of such blood-sucking entities, but also proving his own worth in bringing one out into the light to show to them. Or perhaps befriending the Bigfoot that had come and used his belt sander, bringing him to skool one day and showing that, see, everyone! Dib was hardly crazy for seeing this hairy biped monster in his garage, he just happened to look. Or even, he didn't dare dream, thwarting an alien invasion single-handedly and proving to the world that he wasn't an insane, incompetent nuisance, but rather a highly-skilled, intelligent hero who could and would rise above all others and take it upon himself to rescue his entire race from the clutches of an advanced alien species bent on taking over Earth.

His wish, for the most part, was granted.

Zim had come to Earth, and Dib had thwarted his endless schemes more than just a few times since then, but even in eight years' time, Dib was still an outcast. Everyone still thought he was crazy. He was no hero, even if he had single-handedly captured the alien menace bent on taking over Earth twice now, he was just a childish, obsessive, crazy kid who, according to the kids at school, was just "too stupid to tell how stupid he was." Even the Swollen Eyeball had started to dismiss his constant attempts to prove Zim's identity as an alien, because none of his evidence was conclusive enough for them. The Swollen Eyeball, his colleagues and peers in intellect, and even they rejected his claims.

Dib always thought that if he could only show his peers, whether they be peers in age or in intellect, that very menace that he always spoke of, they would see the light. They would understand what Dib had been fighting all his life; they would recognize him as the savior he really, truly was. The savior that swooped in from social obscurity to save those who ridiculed him, the savior who could see clearly that light of truth that all others cringed away from for fear of turning blind. But not a single one of them opened their eyes to the very real and tangible truth standing (or sitting or running or fighting or experimenting) before them. And while they only became blinder and blinder in the face of a brighter and realer light, Dib only opened his eyes and enlightened himself to yet another truth.

Discovering their ignorance, willful and blissful and born from their inherent tunnel vision, trained upon the normal and blind to anything but, was the first thing Dib knew he had to thank Zim for.

It didn't take long after that for Dib to learn that one realization leads quickly to another.

Dib had always known that he was hated among his peers. Countless wedgies and taunts and bouts of laughter at him back when he was a kid made this easier to pick up on than it needed to be. Back in Ms. Bitters's class, and even later on in Hi Skool, nobody ever wanted to sit with him at lunch, or work with him on projects, or do anything with him. Not that he really wanted them to, of course, but their fierce reluctance to so much as look at him stung a little bit, and he grew to hate them more and more with nearly each passing day.

After a time, he even found himself thinking that, ironically, he probably hated the student body more than Zim did.

And it was that realization that led him to realize that he never really wanted to save these people from the alien's plan to destroy them. He wanted to show them their folly, wanted to show them he had been right, but actually saving them was another matter entirely. After all, there was only so far he could go in fighting for the fate of the world while still claiming to be fighting for all those worthless children that had always hated him for close to no reason. Most of them deserved it, after all, whether the "it" in question was destruction or slavery. Some of his fellow Agents in the Swollen Eyeball may still be worth saving, and they were hardly worth the immense work he put into stopping Zim's schemes. Of course, Dib couldn't say that he didn't feel the need to preserve his own way of life, to whatever extent excluded being hated by all humanity. But even that hardly seemed like a battle to save the world.

After all, what else was there to Dib's life besides his rivalry with Zim?

His family ignored him as actively as his peers, and his sister seemed to hate him almost more than they did. Dib regretted Gaz's hatred for him, wished he could do something about it, as she really had only been the only one who had ever seen the truth alongside him. She was the only one who could, if she wanted to, vouch for Dib's sanity. There really were aliens, and one was here on Earth! Dib was right all along! But his sister, his darling little sister, wouldn't help him even if he was being tortured right before her eyes. His father wasn't around enough to be able to care about Dib one way or the other, and nowadays he could only display mild disappointment at best towards his son's capers. It always astonished Dib that his own father, a world-renowned scientist, could be so amazingly blind. And that hardly reflected well on the rest of his life, as he garnered only more of his father's disappointment by choosing not to apply for any college just yet. Dib tried to explain, he really did, that he needed to stop the alien menace rather than flee the state in search of a school that wouldn't turn him away at the door for being "Membrane's crazy kid," but his father wouldn't hear a word of it. Dib still wasn't sure just how long he could hope to be able to stay at his home before his father and Gaz finally pressured him to leave.

He tried to make up for it by getting himself a job, but his accursed reputation preceded him and only Bloaty's Pizza Hog would welcome him into the ranks of their staff. Two weeks of that job and two weeks of being endlessly tormented by an enormous pig costume and by Zim's sharp, obnoxious laugh were more than enough for him to quit. Dib knew well how that must have looked to his family; he wasn't an idiot. His family, and those who had been his fellow students in Hi Skool, and the rest of the city, and the rest of the world probably knew him as none other than that crazy alien-hunting kid, a nuisance to everyone around him, and a lazy bum who couldn't even keep a job. Dib, needless to say, hated it.

But then there was Zim.

All the energy he didn't spend on going to college or getting a job, he spent on working hard to keep Zim as far as possible from conquering Earth. All the energy they assumed was simply being wasted away sitting on the couch and waiting for Mysterious Mysteries to come on was utterly exhausted by the end of the day as he took it upon itself to be the sole savior of the Earth, rescuing his race from the cold clutches of an advanced alien race. Every brain cell that the world was sure he had lost after potentially being dropped on his ("big and stupid") head as an infant was spent translating the Irken text Zim fed into the computer at his base, learning all he could about the next overly-extravagant plan, and taking deliberate steps and precautions to make sure it never came to fruition.

And when he wasn't hard at work doing that, he took the initiative himself. He developed more refined weapons for himself, and put together his own plans and schematics for taking down the alien menace threatening his planet. He broke into Zim's house and even succeeded in taking away a few gadgets for studying in his father's lab. He even almost stole one of Zim's lawn gnomes once! And he still continuously developed increasingly more foolproof methods of revealing Zim's identity as an Irken, even, just in case there was somebody out there who would listen.

But nobody ever listened, and Dib's plans to capture the alien hadn't worked. They seemed caught in an even battle, two outcasts that nobody on Earth would ever acknowledge of their own narrow-sighted will, trapped in a war for the fate of the planet and all its inhabitants.

After a time, however, Dib stopped protecting the Earth. And as such, Zim stopped attacking it, simple as that. But within such a complex and convoluted war as the one the two of them maintained, such a change could only be called simple because it went by completely unnoticed. He could hardly figure out which of them had mentally given up on the planet first, but after three years of fighting back and forth had gone by and Zim had finally captured Dib for that first time, the Earth had already stopped being in any danger. Because at that point, when he woke up at his own doorstep, barely remembering anything that occurred at Zim's base but knowing that he had been allowed to get away, he knew that Zim no longer wanted Dib dead, and this came as less of a surprise than he felt it should have. And Dib knew he had every right to expose Zim as the alien he was the first, then second time he had captured the invader. But throughout each experience, he had known that he wouldn't be able to put Zim on an alien autopsy table. So much life and fiery confidence and stubborn resolve didn't deserve to dissolve in the poison of a lethal injection.

Dib supposed that he had known for a while already that he had never truly hated Zim. He supposed he realized it when he started working with what his father called "real, legitimate science." Not that paranormal investigation wasn't a legitimate field, mind you, but that's another topic altogether. He finally had his father's approval back then, and with his father's approval came the world's approval. The kids at school didn't make fun of him anymore, and for a while, he really thought he was happy. But steadily, the allure of his rivalry with Zim called to him more and more, and to his great surprise, he could not resist.

He had weighed the approval of the entire world against his twisted, selfish relationship with Zim, and Zim had won.

And, Dib supposed, the next step was really only natural. Or maybe not natural, but certainly logical and so much so that it seemed almost destined to happen. He had long since learned that one thing inevitably leads to another, one realization to the next, one alien arrival to one endless rivalry, one obsession to one desperate attachment. Even back when he was a kid, eight years ago, he didn't need to know Zim for more than ten minutes to know that he was obsessed. He couldn't help watching this peculiar creature before him. The way Zim walked, the way he talked, the calculation in his eyes as he looked over the cafeteria food in disgust, his amusing reactions to everyday substances, whether they be water or meat, his undying loyalty towards his leaders. And it truly was just a fascination; it was a basic need of Dib's to learn as much as he could about this strange alien culture lying just a few million light years beyond the cosmic horizon. Dib couldn't help but watch Zim obsessively, recording everything he saw within his mind as though he himself was a camera.

He watched as Zim slowly but surely adapted to life at Skool over his two years there, then adapted to Hi Skool, then adapted to everything else. He stared deep into Zim's cold, disgusted stare as the alien looked curiously at the most simple of things, be it a flower or a jump rope or the jungle gym outside the Skool, and he watched as Zim took it all in, placing it far beneath him on some sort of egotistical ladder but learning all his limited attention span would allow him to nonetheless. Dib watched Zim as much as he possibly could, first to spot a weakness, then almost as an attempt to read his thoughts. He was only curious, after all; what could the alien possibly hope to accomplish by placing that strange Irken device on a tree? What was Zim doing, experimenting on those squirrels? Was there some reason why he tested samples of cafeteria food in his desk during classes, or was it just some way to quench boredom? Even Zim's tendency to rant didn't tell Dib nearly enough to soothe the human's ever-growing curiosity.

He watched, curious and fascinated and needing to know more and more and more, through the eyes of the lawn gnome he hacked into as Zim stepped out of the Skool Bus and into his base. He switched his gaze to another monitor to watch as the Irken goose-stepped into his kitchen, grabbing one of his strange Irken "licking sticks," as Dib had taken to thinking of them, or a stack of waffles, and plopping down onto his couch and removing his disguise. As Zim sat, resting on the couch and watching his stolen cable TV, eating and calmed down from the near-endless yelling that had no-doubt occurred during the day. Dib sat beside him on the other side of town, watching him intently. He was certain now that he would not find out anything new watching Zim in his break time, but that didn't matter. Years had told him that this was no different from watching the alien's actions from the other end of the classroom, and meant nothing new. After all, he reminded himself time and again, he was only curious, that was all.

But being so obsessed with Zim and everything the Irken did, so attached to his rivalry with him, and going through the throes of teenagerhood, he could hardly help it if his obsession had become some unintended beast of an attachment to the alien without whom Dib was not sure he could live. And indeed, he became sure over time that life without Zim would be dull and meaningless, if it were even possible. This alien gave him purpose, gave him something to strive for, gave him that great gift that everyone yearns for privately throughout their lives. Without Zim, Dib's life would be nothing, and he knew that all too well. The rivalry that Zim had given him was the greatest gift in the world: a meaning, a purpose, something to look forward to each morning, and Dib found himself thinking from time to time as he watched his screens that he wished that he could thank Zim for that.

But Dib realized at some point, and he was not sure when, even that the rivalry stopped being enough.

He wouldn't have even known if he hadn't started to notice that going home with new bruises and a disk of what was almost conclusive evidence of alien life no longer satisfied him. Brawls of glaring back and forth across the classroom or the neighborhood or across town on holographic projectors, and going through all the motions of a real fight, or throwing a water balloon into Zim's open window, or preparing to stop yet another one of Zim's spectacular plots, none of it really appealed. Dib found himself more fascinated in staring at the screen as Zim sat on the couch, content in doing nothing, if only for a moment. Zim's calm, relaxed face, changing the channel on the television, antennae leaning back lazily with their tips coming to rest against the cushions on the back of the couch, all for only a moment or two before his expression contorted into rage once more at GIR and whatever the little robot had done to set Robodad on fire.

Dib found himself wondering at times what the use of all the rivalry between himself and the alien was if neither of them seemed bent on winning anymore. Zim had captured Dib time and time again, and Dib had returned the favor twice already. And yet they still did this, fought with everything they had to maintain a twisted, bitter rivalry that served no purpose other than to keep itself afloat, their lifeboat in a sea of worthlessness. Dib couldn't help but think that things could be better than that.

After all, it was only natural. One thing always led to another, and obsessed as he was with Zim, who could blame him for only becoming more obsessed as time went on? Who could blame him for needing to watch the alien, to take note of him, to see him as often as he could? He needed someone, after all, everybody needed _someone_. Zim was only more than perfect. Nobody could truly tell him that it was wrong; Zim had been around for nearly half of Dib's life by now and the alien knew Dib better than anyone. And unlike everyone else, Zim didn't seem to want to go away. Zim was the only real solid, comforting force in Dib's life, so could anyone really blame him for watching the Irken on his monitors up in his room, fascinated by the strange alien and all that he did, admiration welling within him at the many things that set Zim so far apart from—and perhaps above—Dib's own race? At the many little quirks that set Zim so far apart—and in Dib's eyes, above—the Irken's own race?

Could he really, truly, honestly help it if Zim—not the rivalry, just Zim and nobody else fulfilled him and completed him? He couldn't stop watching the alien day and night, it seemed, not even if he wanted to, for even his dreams now were plagued (blessed?) by soft green skin and curious slick antennae and wide, red eyes, softly aglow with approval, acceptance, _affection_.

Yes, Dib knew all too well that he wanted something more with Zim than just a petty rivalry with complex rules.

And as he sat in his computer chair and watched Zim work in his lab, he was hesitant to label that something worth thanking.


	3. Similar, Different

Between the two of them, Dib and Zim had almost too many similarities. They were stubborn, they were obsessive, their tempers could get harsh, they hated giving up, the list could and did go on. It was, after all, those similarities that kept them together, kept their rivalry fueled. And it was those similarities that formed the basis and some of the best parts of their twisted relationship, pressing them together fist to fist and ego against ego like water droplets, clinging to each other no matter what. And through all their similarities, they could not help but have their differences: tiny, insignificant things that rendered them separate from each other and unable to agree, solidifying their relationship like the pull between opposite ends of a magnet. For the most part, both the Irken and the human were fully aware of each of their broad similarities and precise differences, and could very likely, if pumped full of truth serum and forced to talk, come up with a list that was almost complete.

But they shared more similarities than they knew, it seemed, tiny ones that rendered them capable of agreement on a number of subjects, were they to ever talk about them. Little opinions and little bits of thought process that connected them like such things connect ordinary human friends, something neither of them had really experienced throughout their lives and continued to be oblivious to even then. And one of those little things involved the night that lay around them at one, specific moment in time.

Though they stood at at opposite ends from each other in every way, with Zim standing alert outside one wall of the Membrane residence and Dib lying asleep on the other side of the wall two stories up, they both knew that nighttime in its late hours, when the streets of Earth were cleared of humans that had retired to their beds, was the most exhilarating of times. For Zim it meant a clear view of stars he could not identify and a galaxy full of races that he both sneered at and respected, a universe waiting to be conquered, and a home watching him from beyond the frontier, waiting for him to prove himself, waiting to accept him. It meant waiting until the Dib was asleep and then going out and spreading the seeds that would serve to initiate his latest plan. For Dib, it meant the waking hour of vampires and werewolves and all manner of paranormal creatures taking advantage of the darkness cloaking the Earth, including Zim. It meant outer space, where Zim had come from and where Zim would go when he was done, where he and Zim had fought on numerous occasions, the outer reaches of which Dib hoped he could explore. It was during the night when Zim could fly out on his Voot Cruiser without his disguise and not worry about all of humanity seeing him, and as such it was during the night when Dib could hope to capture such events on video and submit them to Mysterious Mysteries.

And it was during that one, specific night that Zim could dare to fly his Voot cruiser to land outside Dib's window. He was calm, sitting in his Irken ship among a human neighborhood, and he pushed a few buttons wordlessly to disguise the vehicle as a large bush, then stepped out of the cockpit in his usual disguise. He supposed it might have looked odd, a short green man jumping suspiciously out of a bush that sprouted like magic in no time at all, carrying a sack and about to scale the wall of Professor Membrane's home. Eight years of living on this accursed planet had taught him at least that much. But those eight years had likewise taught him the lesson he had been quick to teach to Dib: none of these wretched worm-babies noticed, and the ones that did, hardly understood what the sight meant, nor did they care. They were all to quick to dismiss and ignore and forget. Comfortable in that knowledge, and doubly so under the cover of night, Zim didn't waste a thought on the disastrous potential of being discovered by a passer-by who, for whatever reason, happened to be awake.

He allowed his PAK to release his spider-like mechanical legs and he hung loosely, suspended by them as they picked their way easily up the wall and arrived at Dib's window. He furrowed his brow in irritation as he peered inside at Dib's sleeping form.

"Stupid, weak, vulnerable human... I could destroy him right now and he would not even realize it!" Zim proclaimed in frustration as he grabbed onto the edges of the window. He didn't bother checking whether or not it was open; that possibility didn't occur to him. He simply secured the grip his Irken claws held on the window and brought his mechanical legs before him, effortlessly forming a rectangle with their tips and charging a laser.

Zim laughed to himself at the thought of the look on Dib's face when an Irken laser flies over his head and wakes him up, but unfortunately, he didn't really get to see it. He was hardly that quick, after all. When he let the laser loose and watched as it vaporized the window before him and flew ahead to print a scorch mark on Dib's wall, he could only hear the human's surprised gasp as Dib awoke with a start.

Later on, Dib would decide that Zim's timing at the moment had been spot-on. A few minutes later and things may have well been very awkward in ways he did not like to imagine.

Lying in his bed, both in reality and at the beginning of his blissful dream, he watched as an Irken's soft lips approached his own and as lively red eyes full of passion locked with his and then slipped shut. The petite form of Zim hovered just slightly above him, just slightly, teasing him just by being there. His vision was blurry, like he wasn't wearing his glasses, but he could feel each explicit and exact detail of the hot air around him and the quivering in his fingers as they ached and longed to reach up towards the alien's soft green skin, to brush that skin with his fingertips, to run his hands over that skin, gently, forcefully, to—

His desires hovered around him in the heavy air, but he was frozen to the spot, couldn't move at all. Zim was gone, replaced by a flash of light that forced his eyes open and forced his body back to his _real_ bed. He didn't even have time to react to the dream ending before his subconscious realized that he was probably in danger and should probably grab his glasses.

"Huh, what?! Zim?!" Dib guessed automatically as he watched the laser fizzle out of existence against the wall just above his computer.

"Very good, Dib," replied the alien with a smirk as he stepped over Dib's bed and onto the floor, putting away his mechanical legs. He laughed, relishing his rival's disheveled and vulnerable state, delighted by the utterly disoriented look in the human's eyes.

And Dib was more than disoriented. The transition came slowly as he realized he was awake and that Zim really was standing before him, arms crossed and wearing his disguise, holding a sack with who knows what inside. He wanted nothing more than for Zim to disappear at that moment, for him to hold off on whatever he was plotting until the next day, or until an hour later, or whenever. Because at that moment, and Dib knew it was making him blush, he was still getting over the very real impression his dream's Zim had left in his mind, and the last thing he needed was reality washing over him as forcefully as this. He was still halfway through comprehending that the ideal world of his dream was not really there, and that standing before him was Zim, as an enemy, and nothing else.

"You won't get away with... with... whatever it is that you're doing!" claimed Dib as he finally fought the state of mind left over from his dream away, forcing it back into the recesses of his (not that big!) head.

But Zim only laughed, loud and obnoxious. The stink-boy thought he was plotting something against him! What foolishness! Not that Zim wasn't, of course, but that was far from why he was there, standing before Dib as the human shuffled out of bed and onto his feet.

"That's where you're wrong, stink-beast, I will get away with my latest ingenious plan! For I am Zim, and Zim's plans are fla—"

"Shut up before you wake up my neighbors, you jerk," Dib snapped crankily in the middle of listening to Zim's voice, which was far too raucous and far too loud and far too lively for such a late hour.

"Oh, right." Zim cleared his throat and quieted down slightly—not nearly enough, both of them knew, but slightly. "Zim's plans are flawless! But no, Dib-stink, that is not why I'm here."

"Then why'd you wake me up?" asked Dib incredulously.

"Let me finish!"Zim snapped, then continued, calmer, but still menacing with what sounded like a threat soaked into each of his words, "As you know, human, your kind are prone to dying in a matter of only a few years. You will be gone long before I rebuild your filthy planet into a worthy addition to the Irken Empi--"

"What makes you think I won't get rid of you first?!"

"Silence! As I was saying, you'll be dead long before we even finish the Organic Sweep! It's just a matter of time, Dib! Your kind barely even live as long as it takes to get through basic Irken military training!" Zim ranted, building up his argument in hopes that the human would accept what he was about to do without needing too much explanation. He needed Dib to see that he, Zim, had had yet another ingenious thought and had come up with an ingenious plan once again, not for him to ask questions about why Zim's ingenious plan revolved around helping Dib this time around.

Dib, however, was only growing more and more confused with each of Zim's words. Of all the things the invader had ever done, this ranked among the most unusual. He supposed he could chalk it up as another of Zim's vagaries and purely the fault of his defective PAK and his limited thought processes, but at the same time... Even Zim didn't seem the type to wake his mortal enemy up to gloat about how much longer Irkens lived. Dib's curiosity peaked alongside his annoyance, and then his annoyance kept rising. Just what was Zim trying to do, telling Dib all of this? Dib scowled, teeth clenching just slightly and almost imperceptibly.

"Just what the hell is your point, Zim?! I don't need you to tell me I'm mortal! Or did you just figure that out for yourself and thought you'd come tell me just in case I don't already know?" he finished with a sneer. Only Zim, he decided, was so stupid and insensitive that he would come and wake a guy up in the middle of the night to tell him that he was going to die in a few decades.

"You stupid, insolent human! Zim comes to you with a gift and yet this is how you thank me?!" Zim growled, glaring harshly at the ungrateful Earth-monkey before him.

"Gift?" Dib asked, irritated and disbelieving, "You give your enemies gifts now?"

"Allow me to explain," Zim said, voice calmer now and betraying none of the anger his eyes still held. He reached into the sack he held, ignoring the way Dib's eyes darted suspiciously to the hand rummaging inside the sack. But then he pulled it out and held it in his hands, letting the empty sack droop, neglected, to the floor. There it was, in his hands, the product of four years of research and four years of work. The PAK Zim held resembled his own in a number of ways, including its smooth metallic surface and its signature shape, the way it was designed to connect onto the back and the unsurpassed life support system it contained. Outwardly, its colors and designs differed from those of an ordinary PAK, as Zim had not built in the mechanical legs or the communicator or any of the tools an Irken PAK normally contained. He hardly owed _that_ much to his rival.

"What...?" Dib whispered confusedly as he stared at the device held in Zim's arms. "What the hell is this, Zim?"

"Stupid Earth-monkey, it's a PAK! With all the brains inside that tremendous head of yours, I thought you could figure that much out for yourself!" Zim proclaimed impatiently.

"My head's not big!" he snapped instinctively, then went on to respond to the rest of the alien's words, "I know what it is, Zim, but why did you bring it here?!" Dib stared at the alien suspiciously, trying hard to decipher his intentions. For all the eight years Dib had watched the Irken obsessively for, he had no shred of information with which to account for Zim's bizarre actions.

"Because! Zim cannot possibly show you your proper defeat within your pathetic human lifespan! What's the point of taking over this revolting planet of filth if you won't be alive to see its downfall, hmm?"

"You're insane! What are you talking about?!"

"Shut up! I'm trying to get some sleep!" Gaz's voice screamed from the other side of the hallway through two closed doors and a pillow over her face. "Take your stupid fight to Zim's house!"

"Your stupidity has already caused your sister to awaken!" Zim hissed, "Come over here and let me attach this to you before you wake up the rest of the filthy neighborhood!"

"I don't trust you, Zim, what are you trying to do?!"

"You stupid, stupid, stupid little Earth-monkey! Do you not yet understand?!"

"Well, duh, of course not. That's why I'm asking! Get it?"

"As I have said before, I cannot allow you to die before I can properly destroy you! So put this on so that I can destroy you!" Zim stepped forward a few steps, brandishing the PAK menacingly.

Dib took a few steps back to mirror Zim, not bothering to hide the blatant fear in his eyes and stopping as he reached the edge of his bed. "Gaz!" he yelled, panicking, "Gaz, quick, come help me!'

"Your stupid voice isn't letting me sleep!" shouted his sister, getting angrier and angrier with each word.

"Well, if you wanna beat me up you have to come in here and beat up Zim first!" he shouted, stepping up onto his bed, back to his window and watching Zim's angry glare.

"Why do you call for help?! Zim is not trying to hurt anyone right now!" the alien hissed.

"I'll beat you _both _up tomorrow morning! I'm trying to sleep!"

"Damnit, Gaz..." Dib grumbled as he slipped out the window and prayed that there was a bush down below to break his fall. He fell awkwardly, arms and legs splayed out around him and back to what he knew was a rapidly-approaching ground. And although the ground approached in the span of only about a second, perhaps two, it felt like an eternity for him; it was a familiar feeling. After all, time seemed to always go in slow motion as he approached his doom by Zim's hands, and that had almost happened now on more occasions than he could count.

That didn't change how deathly afraid he was of breaking a limb or an organ or his spine. Oh, he really hoped there was a bush down there to break his fall...

His wish, for the most part, was granted.

He let out a pained "oof" as he felt his back collide with a smooth, round surface which he promptly slid forward off of. The Voot Cruiser's disguise projectors malfunctioned at the impact, turning the ship briefly into a pig and then shutting off entirely, leaving the Cruiser exposed.

"You revolting little worm!" shouted Zim as he scaled the wall with his mechanical legs, still holding the PAK under one arm, and taking in the sight of Dib alongside the Voot Cruiser. "You dented my ship! Zim will make you pay!"

"I thought," Dib started, cringing in pain and fighting to keep his consciousness, "you weren't trying to hurt anyone right now?"

Zim growled. "The stink-human is right..." he grumbled mostly to himself. He walked over to his ship and pressed his hand against a small panel on its smooth exterior, opening the cockpit. He tossed Dib's PAK inside and turned to the human. "Come," he sneered, still irritated, "Before your neighbors see my ship."

"I'm not going anywhere, space boy!" Dib snapped, glaring defiantly from his place on the ground, trying and failing to ignore the aching throughout his body, centered in his back and running shakily to his legs and arms and up his neck to his head.

"Insolent human!" Zim exclaimed, utterly frustrated, before stepping over to Dib and lifting him up with little effort. The human weighed more than Zim did, but being Irken, Zim's strength was far enough enhanced to be able to hold the Dib and drop him unceremoniously into the Voot Cruiser.

"Ow! Zim, you bastard, what are you doing?!"

"Silence! Do you want to wake up the entire planet?!" Zim climbed in, taking the pilot's seat and closing the cockpit.

"You... you _jerk..." _and with that, Dib finally fell unconscious.

***

Looking back on the situation days and weeks and months later, Dib would realize that it was so utterly ironic, and then he would roll his eyes at how stupid the irony really was. After all, he _had _always wanted to wake up in Zim's arms, he supposed.

When he woke up groggily from his death-like state after passing out inside the alien's ship, his first realization was that he was being carried in Zim's arms towards the nearby elevator. His second realization was that they were at Zim's base. He blinked once, then twice, eyes barely open, and took note of the dull ache that still pulsed through his body and destroyed any desire within him to struggle. After all, it was one thing to want to get out of the clutches of an evil alien menace, and it was another thing entirely to struggle against said alien menace when he knew full well that he'd only be dropped onto the floor and then kicked the rest of the way to the elevator. And besides, everything still hurt from falling two stories onto Zim's ship, so being dropped onto the floor became an even less desirable option.

So, all things considered, Dib decided that pretending to still be asleep would be the best course of action.

Zim's peripheral vision noticed a slight fluttering of Dib's eyelashes, and he looked down at the human in his arms to confirm. "Hmm? Are you awake, stink-beast?"

No response as Dib tried his best to keep his breathing steady and not give himself away.

Zim sighed nonchalantly and stepped into the elevator. "Guess not."

Two stories whizzed by easily behind the thin walls of the closet-sized area. From the attic to the living room, from the open elevator to the couch, from silence to GIR's nonsensical babbling as he played with a squeaky toy pig, half a minute hardly passed before Zim had dropped Dib unceremoniously onto the couch (at which Dib winced, and found himself lucky as Zim failed to notice) and stood looming over him.

Zim smirked at the human, deciding that this would surely count as yet another victory. He had the human lying helplessly vulnerable, asleep even, and could destroy him at any moment if he for whatever reason would want to. As Zim ran his eyes over the form of the sleeping human, he frowned. Dib's limp body lay utterly useless on the couch, his face expressionless, and only his hair seemed to be defiantly alive in its tendency to stick up. Dib, Zim mused disapprovingly, might as well be dead. It would have scared Zim if he hadn't known that this was only a natural reaction humans had to trauma and exhaustion, and the alien had long since decided it was a worthless adaptation. It disgusted him how weak humans were in their natural quirks that even the strongest humans had to carry.

"Oooh," GIR cooed, "That Dib? He come back to play some more?"

"No, GIR," snapped Zim, turning away from Dib as the human cracked an eye open and slowly began to stand. Dib had had enough experience escaping from Zim (as well as from various authority figures) that he knew an opportunity when one presented itself. Zim was completely unaware of the escape attempt and he continued chastising GIR, "He's unconscious!"

"Nooo he's not!" squealed GIR playfully.

Dib cringed, hurrying toward the door, praying that Zim wouldn't turn around.

"Yes he is, GIR, just look!" Zim motioned towards the empty couch, looking at it himself. He froze, confused. "What? Where'd h—Oh you wretched worm!"

"Told ya so! I told you so!" GIR cried happily, grinning and hopping up and down in his oblivious way.

"Oh no, damnit!" Dib exclaimed, ignoring the aching in his body as he sprinted towards the door.

"Get back here, Dib!" growled Zim, releasing his mechanical legs and running around Dib to block his way to the door. "How dare you try to escape Zim's base!"

GIR stopped in his hopping up and down when he realized that he had thrown his pig toy into the kitchen in his excitement, and he ran to retrieve it, blubbering incoherently. Seconds later, after he had thrown himself into the underground lab through the toilet, his voice couldn't be heard anymore.

"Did you just ask me why I'm trying to escape the clutches of an alien bent on taking over the world? You're stupider than I thought!" retorted Dib.

"You fool! You will not leave without that PAK!"

"I don't know what your plan is, Zim, but it's not gonna work! I'm not falling for it!"

"This has nothing to do with my next evil plan, stupid human stink-beast!"

"I don't believe you!"

"Are you accusing _me_, the great Zim, of lying?!"

"Of course I—"

"Answer me! Are you?!" Zim interrupted, scowling menacingly.

"I just told you! Of course I am!"

"You disgusting, stupid little human! Zim cannot believe you are so ungrateful!' Zim exclaimed, utterly frustrated with the human's idiocy. After all the work Zim had done, Dib still didn't trust him enough to know that Zim wasn't trying to hurt him for once! He scowled as he lowered himself back onto the floor and put away his PAK's spider-like legs.

Dib cursed himself for jumping out of that window earlier; if he wasn't hurting so much all over he'd just jump out of one of the windows here instead. It wasn't as painful a fall if they were on the first floor anyway, after all. "Why do you keep saying I'm ungrateful? You haven't even done anything that I should thank you for yet!" A small part of Dib's subconscious told him he was lying, but he smothered it. His subconscious should know what he meant, after all.

"That's because you keep trying to run away, stink-beast, and you won't let Zim explain!" the Irken hissed, hating every moment of what he knew should have been a very simple procedure. He made a mental note to never try anything like this on anyone else, ignoring the fact that the need probably wouldn't arise.

Dib visibly struggled against his own thoughts for a moment, then let his curiosity win. "Fine, Zim, fine! You know what? Go ahead and explain."

"Finally!" exclaimed Zim exasperatedly before beginning his explanation. "It's simple, human. In just a matter of a few of Earth's decades, you'll be dea—"

"I know that already! Get to the point."

"You know nothing, Earth-stink!" Zim exclaimed. "As I was saying, you won't even live long enough to see Earth become an addition to the Irken Empire. I wish to fix this problem by extending your pathetic lifespan so that I will not have to limit myself to only a few of Earth's years to destroy you."

Dib stared at Zim disbelievingly. "You're kidding."

"Zim is very serious."

"You want to keep me around for few hundred more years so that you can take your time with Earth before you just kill me anyway? Gee, Zim, thanks!" Dib spat out, angry that he had apparently become the Irken's plaything rather than an equal. Eight years of rivalry, eight years of being at opposite sides but still acknowledging one another as equals, and now this?! Dib could barely believe it. Ironic as it seemed, he never expected such an utter betrayal from his mortal enemy.

Zim was taken aback, confused at Dib's reaction. "It is hardly like that, human! I am offering you a gift, and yet yo—"

"Would you stop saying that?! Did it ever even occur to you that maybe I don't want to fight against you for the rest of my life?!"

"If you wanted to stop, you wouldn't have let me go upon capturing me in the past," Zim pointed out.

"That's not important!" shot Dib, angry that he couldn't make the alien see. Dib didn't want to be Zim's toy, he didn't want to be Zim's rival, he wanted to be what Zim was to him and Zim was _everything _to Dib. It never even occurred to him that Zim only thought of him as part of some sick, twisted game that the Irken would play around with for a while and then just toss aside when he was done.

"How is it not important if it is keeping you from accepting Zim's charitable gesture?"

"Well, it's because..." Dib struggled with himself to come up with a reasonable lie to avoid revealing a truth that seemed almost taboo to him. He stood reaching about for this lie, holding an awkward pause in the air for a split second that felt timeless.

"You're lying!" snapped Zim suspiciously without bothering to let Dib continue. "Answer me, Earth-stink, why do you not take my offer to extend your tiny lifespan?"

"You only want to extend my lifespan so that you can fight me for a few more decades until you get bored! I'm not interested in being some kind of screwed-up Irken toy, Zim."

"When did I say that you would be anything like that, human?"

Dib stared stolidly into Zim's narrowed eyes, hating the encounter more and more with each passing minute. "I took a guess when you told me that you only wanted me around so you could keep on fighting me."

Zim scowled inwardly at the small defeat. He had said that, hadn't he? It angered the Irken—almost saddened him, even—that he couldn't make the human want to be around for hundreds more years as they engaged in their endless rivalry. Zim needed that rivalry; couldn't Dib see that?! He couldn't just find another Dib on another planet! "But you enjoy our little war as much as I do, no?"

"Apparently not, since I at least wouldn't force you to stick around on Earth just to fight me!" Dib knew he was probably lying. He'd do anything to keep Zim on Earth, but if he was going to win this, he needed the moral high ground. Not that he thought Zim had any morals, but that was beside the point. "That's just sick, you know that, Zim?"

Zim's antennae flattened against his head under the wig he hadn't yet removed. He couldn't explain it and he doubted he'd ever be able to, but it stung to hear those words Dib threw at him so earnestly. Months and years and decades later, he might reflect on those words and he might realize that those words could have hurt him more deeply and thoroughly than the Almighty Tallest finally rejecting him from the Irken race. Dib was more important than he'd ever have admitted, and he would likely never admit out loud just how important Dib really was. He worked on that PAK for years, all just to keep the Dib around without considering, even for a moment, that his effort would be so utterly rejected. He stood in place, staring at the human with an expression of anger that slowly faded as the passion fueling it gave way to memories of all the tests he had run and all the prototypes he had made and all the time he had spent...

"Zim? Answer me," Dib ordered, uneasy at Zim's uncharacteristic silence.

Dib, it seemed to the Irken, did not even want to be around Zim enough to accept all the work Zim had invested.

"You will not take the PAK?" Zim asked, quietly and confusedly, but careful to leave the shred of hurt out of his voice and replace it with anger.

"That's what I already said," Dib stated simply, staring suspiciously at the alien before him.

Zim scowled, realization welling within him. "So you will go on and just die in a few of your decades and leave Zim all alone?!" he spat out, the realization that he would really, truly be all alone after Dib was gone hitting him far too hard to let him realize what it was he was saying.

Dib's eyes widened at the sudden outburst. "Wh—what? Zim, what are you saying?"

"What does it sound like, stink-worm?! Do you know so little?! The great and almighty Zim chooses to spend years creating a device that would allow you to live, and you repay me by choosing death above me, _Zim_?!"

"That's not what I meant at all!"

"I have chosen you, stink-worm, above everybody else! Can you not comprehend that Zim wants you alive? That I have absolutely no desire to watch you age and rot with the rest of your disgusting species? What use have I for a filthy, filthy planet like this if you are dead?!" Zim finished his rant, seething from letting such hurt and betrayal pour from his angry words. He chose not to dwell on the things his words unveiled, the feelings he normally chose to ignore and bury deep beneath plans to win a pointless war, feelings now laid out neatly in the silence for his rival to read and do with as the human wished. He ignored all that, focusing instead on anger and disbelief and the tense air around them that waited for Dib to respond.

Dib only stood, dumbfounded, pure uncomprehending surprise printed across his face. What Zim had just said... what it could have meant... What it clearly _did_ mean was simply too much for Dib to take it in all at once. It was more than a shock, learning that he wasn't just a temporary distraction, learning that Zim felt so strongly about having Dib around... And hearing Zim sounding so utterly betrayed! Dib had never even thought of what Zim would do when Dib was gone, but if he had, he hardly would have imagined that he was such an important part of the Irken's life. The implications behind that, the subtler things that Dib's mind rushed to question at... It truly was too much.

But by the look on Zim's face, that angry expression like the eye of the storm passing overhead, separating one half of the catastrophe from the other, Dib knew he needed to gather himself for a response. He needed to say something, something that wouldn't tempt Zim to throw Dib out of his base, something that wouldn't only make the alien angrier at him, something that would change the way things were, something...

"I, um... can't keep fighting you with Irken technology sticking out of my back."

Zim first frowned, then carefully read over Dib's expression and read through the tone of Dib's words. He was hardly an expert on reading emotions but he knew when he had a chance to get what he wanted. And what he wanted stood before him, almost holding his breath in anticipation of Zim's response, unsure of himself with a careful yet all-revealing expression on his face. "Very well, then do not fight me."

Dib nodded once, not considering any implications behind that phrase because the important parts were clear: Zim wanted Dib around, and he was prepared to stop their war to achieve that end. It was more than enough for Dib; it was more than he ever dared imagine would ever happen. He had no way of knowing if he was signing on to help take over Earth or if he was accepting Zim's surrendering. It hardly seemed important, and he knew he could work on convincing Zim to give up on destroying the Earth later, if the need ever arose. But for now, he simply let his expression settle into the easy contentedness that rested along the whole of his being. "Okay, I won't. As long as you won't fight me."

Zim let a pleased smile slip onto his face as he registered this moment as a victory. He had convinced Dib of something that would end their war, after all, and he had not lost. Of course, Dib hadn't either, but that did not make the moment any less of a victory for Zim. He now had, he realized, a plethora of things that he needed to think about; the emotions let free by his angry speech earlier could not be left ignored. But he was happy, ecstatic in the warm realization that he'd have many more years to explore everything about those feelings alongside Dib. For in that moment, he needed only to solidify their truce with his half of the promise. "Of course I won't!"

That was all they needed. Eight years of rivalry, of standing at ends and facing off in an endless game of tug-of-war, of putting each other's lives on the line for the fate of the Earth, and it was over with just that. A peace treaty of their own sort, sealed with their own unbreakable promise that the war was over. There stood no loser, there stood no one, single victor who looked down upon the other. There stood only the two of them, their similarities and their differences and their everything about them holding them together hand to hand and heart to heart. They had said all they needed to render their system of alternate winners and losers worthless, to demolish the boundaries created by opposing sides, to rid them of the wall of war between them.

And now the wall was gone and they could see each other across the open space it left, with nothing keeping them from crossing over into an unknown era of something quite like peace along a bridge made tangible by mutual feelings of mutual obsession, mutual acceptance, and the passion of a stranger and warmer mutual emotion that rose above all others.


End file.
